1. Field of Invention
Western civilization has long considered the odor of human feces to be objectionable, and in fact, has long sought for means to minimize the release of odors resulting from defecation in bathrooms. Many home bathrooms are equipped with ceiling fans which exhaust air from a point high above the origin of the odors, the toilet bowl. These fans are only marginally effective, and in fact, must exhaust very large air volumes to prevent the escape of odor bodies into the rest of the home.
2. Prior Art
In addition to fans built into the bathroom ceiling, there have been numerous attempts to develop "ventilated toilet seats", designed to capture odors at the toilet bowl and exhaust them out of the room. The prior art, Class 4, Subclass 217, is rich with hollowed toilet seats, mechanical exhaust fans operated by electric motors or various mechanical drive means, all ducting objectionable gases either through the wall to the outside, or to an available sewer vent pipe in the bathroom wall. One patent, #900,831, H. W Charlton, Oct. 13, 1908, teaches the use of a water-powered fan wheel, using available water pressure as the energy source to drive the fan. Others teach the use of air-water ejectors to energize air flow from the toilet bowl to the sewer pipe or the vent pipe.
Notwithstanding the potential of these prior attempts to solve the bathroom odor-control problem, no fully adequate and commercially acceptable solution has been found. In most cases, the energy source is not convenient or reliable (or in the case of electricity, safe), and the need to exhaust odors from the room results in the need to modify the structure, which is costly and beyond the scope of do-it-yourself work. #900,831 Charlton does provide the convenient water pressure energy source, but fails to address the problem of extracting the odors from the room.